Why were Samuel Johnson’s parliamentary debates called Debates in the Senate of Magna Lilliputia?

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Painting of Samuel Johnson showing Johnson seated at a desk with a quill in hand and papers before him, wearing a brown coat and white wig. — Samuel Johnson Samuel Johnson, oil on canvas by Sir Joshua Reynolds, c. 1756; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Samuel Johnson’s parliamentary reports were titled "Debates in the Senate of Magna Lilliputia" as a "Swiftian expedient" to circumvent strict prohibitions against reporting on the proceedings of the House of Commons.

Because the British government had punished the reporting of parliamentary proceedings since the spring of 1738, Johnson used this title to frame the speeches as political fiction rather than factual accounts. By referencing the fictional land of Lilliput from the works of Jonathan Swift, Johnson provided the series with satiric overtones, allowing him to publish what were essentially political fictions while masquerading as reports on authentic legislative debates.1